UK law blog

Law Review: Metgate grinds on….

I was hesitant in commenting on the Metgate saga (as I have stated several times in blog posts) partly because other bloggers are doing so and partly because of that old hoary chestnut of evidence. We are all reliant on detail provided from the media and this latest article from Donald Trelford in The Independent is worth a read…

Donald Trelford: Without a paper trail, Coulson will survive

The Independent: Media Studies: Only if Coulson faces criminal charges, or is shown to have lied to MPs, will he lose his job

Trelford writes: “I doubt if the MPs’ committees will link him to any criminal activity. The New York Times certainly didn’t, apart from the uncorroborated testimony of disgruntled former reporters, most of them anonymous, one from someone who had left the News of the World with drug and alcohol problems. And why did the American paper devote three reporters and 6,000 words to a story in Britain? It was to embarrass Murdoch, with whom they are engaged in a cut-throat survival battle against his revamped Wall Street Journal.

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And talking of ‘tricks’…. this….

Former minister in High Court battle over election ‘dirty tricks’

Telegraph: Phil Woolas, the former immigration minister, could be thrown out of Parliament after being accused of breaking electoral law with a “toxic” dirty tricks campaign against a general election rival.

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Kneejerking – a common problem with political people – or a fair point?

This raises the question of whether burglars actually face justice at all. Might it be that those who preside over our criminal justice system – especially judges – are in thrall to the idea that justice is about rehabilitating wrong-doers, rather than punishing them?”

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9 Responses

Douglas Carswell raises a very good point but it is not surprising. Even the 3 year minimum for a third domestic burglary is generally avoided because the judge will somehow be persuaded that there is something relating to the offence or the offender which makes it unjust to impose a 3 year minimum.

I have often thought that one of the problems with burglary is that it is dealt with in legal textbooks as an offence against property. It is much more than that. It makes people fearful or even terrified. In reality, it is a serious offence against the person.

In noting Donald Trelford’s observations on the likelihood that there is no evidence short of criminal charges or an admission he lied to MPs, don’t entirely forget that Coulson is required to appear in Edinburgh at the pre trial hearing of the case against Tommy and Gail Sheridan for perjury. If he has to appear at the trial he will be under oath. There’s a nice overtone of irony should this happen.

Looking at the ‘high level aggravating factors’ that would lean towards the maximum sentence (incidentally, quite a long one), it would appear that this may not be a case of lenient judges, but the CPS going for different charges to reflect the severity of the offence.

Several, for example, would be perfectly valid as charges of robbery, various offences against the person and criminal damage. These could be easier to prove and render charging with burglary entirely unnecessary as it will provide the judge with the requisite sentencing powers. It is therefore possible that the more serious burglaries are dealt with under different charges, with the more simple (and therefore “lenient”) cases being dealt with as simply burglary.

The statistics given also don’t match up to my personal (limited) experience, suggesting that how they have calculated them is open to question. For example, do the statistics count someone getting an IPP sentence for robbery the same as somene getting the life sentence maximum?

It is, if I might say, a rather po faced response from Liverpool Solicitors to my admittedly cynical observation that the likelihood that Coulson will appear in a court in connection with a perjury case is ironic.

max sentences – call me stupid but how many of the available spectrum of those convicted would anyone (other than the fucking news international stable or the male) expect to get the maximum??? that is kind of the point…

After many years as a Police Officer and a somewaht reluctant litigant in the civil courts I really have to agree with the fellow who said, “Justice is at the whim of the Judge.”

Oh. And by the way, it is also my experience that many Judges are “amenable”. Justice is merely a concept. But then, any reader of this blog will have assessed that this status quo has been around for a while, since God was in short trousers in fact.

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